http://www.mandrakesoft.com/partners/advertising

The download version of 9.2 will have bookmarks, screensavers, and default web pages that advertisers can buy space on. All versions will have ads during install. They changed the page, but at first they showed $7000 for the basic package.

I'm torn on this. On one hand, I love using 9.1 On the other hand, even if I buy a boxed copy, I will still have ads forced on me during install.

They have to get some money to "Try to break free of M$..."

As I understood it, the boxed copy will not include ads in the install, only in the bookmarks (easily erased) and the default page of the browsers (and who doesn't change that right away anyway?)

I'm of two minds as well. One the one hand, I dearly love mandrake and it doesn't seem unreasonable to use advertising as a way to subsidize a free product.

On the other hand, ads make me icky...I hate em. I guess it will all depend on how Mandrake handles it. I rarely watch the install screen when I install, and the default page and bookmarks don't stay on my PC very long, so far it doesn't seem like the ads will affect me much.

However, should Mandrake fall down a slippery slope where they try to add in stuff to track me (spyware) then I'll be the first to denounce them...I would hate it tho if they did that as Mandrake is my favorite distro.

Clearly sucks - even get the ads with the boxed version.As the next thing mandrake will probably port gator to Linux.

According to Mandrake's website there will be NO ads in screensavers.
As for the rest, nothing is being forced on us. I didn't even notice the ads in the installer until they mentioned it on their site and in whatever browsers they include, you'll have to choose the bookmark to get the ad.
I don't see a reason to panic yet.

I'm not too worried about it. As noted it can be turned off rather easily. And who knows, if it's managed correctly then some of the ads might actually be useful if they're targeted at MDK and Linux users (not M$ FUD ads).
Most desktop users, BTW, don't turn these things off. We might, and will, but it's amazing how many people still use MSN as their home page after couple of years. "Oh, you can change this????" Activists like us will change it. Others, well, I don't think so :-)

ttfn

John

I would see sense behind it if they would put it on the download version.But the version you (not me anyway) buy?I was already turned off by the bookmarks they had before.

I actually find the bookmarks fairly useful....and Mdk making some money off of linux-related bookmarks doesn't bother me. As for the install, I always switch to detail mode anyway, so I don't get their lovely spiels

And I always change the default web page.

It's really quite amazing that Mandrake can do all this work for (for all intents and purposes) free anyway; they have to get money somewhere, and i'm sure that everyone would far rather have a few extra bookmarks than have to start paying for the product.

http://www1.mandrakelinux.com/en/mdkads.php3 - should clarify things.

I'm not torn on this - I think Mandrake need revenue. I have bought 2 of their boxed sets and if they need advertising revenue to keep producing new distros - so be it. Perhaps if more people supported their favourite distro with money then this issue would never had cropped up.

While generally I don't like ads, I think for a company like Mandrake with so many freeloading users like myself it's pretty much the only way. The linux desktop isn't exactly a hugely profitable market. Hopefully that will change. But until it does they gotta feed the coders. And besides, you can just remove them.

Maybe Redhat or SuSE will buy up some ad space

i do not know about this? i am a new user to mandrake and i like it! un like M$ (click..click..crash,....crash....crash....punch!)
and i think the idea is a good consept but we all know that adverts lead to evilness (spyware) this scares me.....alot!

As mentioned in the slashdot posts, Mandrake is one of the good guys. I highly doubt that this is something they wanted to do and I'm certain that Mandrake hasn't even toyed with the though of spyware. From the way the company has behaved for the last few years it seems to me that they aren't the greedy bastard type.

It all depends how they go about doing it. Were you bothered by the Safari advert when you're desktop appeared after installing 9.1? That's actually were I found out about the service and I will probably subscribe when I scrape some change together. So, It'll be interesting to see how, if at all, intrusive this will be.